The Loners were willing to accept a variety of assets including cash, ships, family members, specialized equipment, bodily organs, and anything else of recognized value.
McCade typed Pegasus’s name and legal description onto the com screen, palm printed the agreement, and swore as it faded from sight. If he or any member of his crew caused damage to Tin Town, or any of its permanent residents, Pegasus would be forfeit.
He didn’t like it, but according to Sister Urillo, there wasn’t much choice. Her sources said that Mustapha Pong had been sighted three times in recent months, all of them in Tin Town, and all of them in the company of a local businessman named Morris Sappo. The habitat was in orbit around a planet called Lexor at the moment, but there was no way to tell if that was a significant part of the Sappo-Pong relationship, or just happenstance. But it could be important, and since no one knew when the Loners might decide to move Tin Town somewhere else, time was short. If McCade wished to find Pong or, failing that, Sappo, he’d have to visit Tin Town, damage deposit and all.
Threading his way through a maze of orbiting ships and free-floating junk, McCade guided Pegasus into the lighted maw of Tin Town’s main hatch.
The hangar was huge, taking up all of what had once been the barge’s number three hold. All sorts of ships formed orderly rows to the right and the left. There were scarred freighters, sleek little one-man scouts, richly appointed space yachts, sturdy-looking tugs, and a scattering of pirate raiders. The latter were not too surprising since Tin Town was one of the few places pirates could openly visit.
Lowering Pegasus into her allotted berth, McCade killed the repellors and turned to his companions. “Welcome to Tin Town, a monument to money, and an eyesore in the sky. All ashore who’s goin’ ashore.”
Though Neem and Reba didn’t seem excited by the prospect, they disappeared into their cabins and showed up a few minutes later ready to go.
Reba was dressed in faded coveralls. She wore a blaster in a cross-draw holster and had a throwing knife sticking out of her right boot top.
McCade had debated the merits of taking Neem versus leaving him on the ship and, based on the Il Ronnian’s previous success, had decided to take him along.
Neem was a vision in black. Black helmet, black visor, and a long black cloak that concealed his tail. He had blasters concealed in his copious sleeves, a wicked looking sword strapped across his back, and variety of knives scattered about his person.
McCade wasn’t sure how Neem would react to actual combat, but he certainly looked like death incarnate, and maybe that would help.
A shuttle bus arrived a few minutes later, sealed its lock against the ship’s and welcomed them aboard. There was something wrong with the vehicle’s voice simulator that caused it to drop every fourth word.
“Welcome toTin...We hope you...enjoy your stay ...You may pay... cash or we...be glad to...you aline...credit secured by...damage deposit. Please... the payment plate ...you wish to ...credit.”
McCade palmed the plate and gave thanks that Swanson-Pierce had provided a thick wad of expense money. If a shuttle ride cost fifty credits a piece, how much would a hotel room be?
The shuttle stopped twice to pick up other passengers before heading for the main terminal. Except for a birdlike Finthian and a wealthy-looking Cellite, it was a largely humanoid crowd.
The Cellite wore richly detailed pajamas. They swished softly with each movement of his stocky body and gave off a spicy scent. He wore a matching skullcap on his rounded head and, lacking a nose, breathed through his thin-lipped mouth.
As he boarded the shuttle the Cellite’s eyestalks darted this way and that, examining his fellow passengers with the friendly curiosity of a small child. Then the alien caught sight of Neem and developed a sudden interest in a viewport.
McCade grinned. Neem’s new disguise was having the desired effect.
The shuttle made lock-to-lock contact with the main terminal, disgorged its passengers, and issued a broken invitation for others to come aboard. Most were more drunk than sober and barely able to stagger aboard with the help of handholds and crewmates.
Reba grinned. “This place makes Spin look like a nursery school.”She had to yell it over the noise of the crowd.
McCade nodded and motioned toward a broad corridor that led away from the lock and toward glittering lights. “Make a hole, Neem. We’ll be right behind you.”
“Having a couple of humans behind me is not my idea of a dream come true,” Neem replied good-naturedly, “but everyone should live dangerously once in a while. Follow me.”
And they did. Both sides of the corridor were lined with wall-to-wall shops: restaurants, bars, whorehouses, clothing stores, equipment dealers, banks, medical clinics, and weapons dealers.
And these were not passive enterprises but centers of frantic activity packed with merchandise and staffed by sentients ready and eager to unload their present stock and bring in more.
Signs blinked, hawkers yelled, and robots scurried through the crowd bleating out their prerecorded messages.“Dark dreams! Dark dreams! A place where dark dreams come true! Corridor five, cross tunnel fourteen. Dark dreams! Dark dreams!”
The air was filled with a heady mix of smells. Smoke, perfume, food, sweat, and other odors too faint to identify all fought for dominance.
McCade noticed that the crowd seemed to bunch up around the more popular haunts and thin out again to pass others by. And although the crowd was made up of all sorts of sentients, all had one thing in common. It was a look, a look that said they needed to acquire something, or satisfy some hidden need before time and money ran out, and they were forced to leave.
And here and there along the edges of the crowd the predators waited, their restless eyes skimming the crowd in search of profit or pleasure. There were all sorts: whores, pimps, thieves, pirates, mercenaries, bounty hunters, and more, all waiting, all living off the weakness of others.
But the tall black thing didn’t look weak, and neither did the man and woman who strode along behind it, so the predators watched but made no move. Strength is difficult to gain and easy to lose so eventually the black thing might still be theirs.
“The House of Yarl.” That was the name Sister Urillo had provided and it was right where she’d said it would be, just off the main corridor along cross tunnel twenty-three.
The name was deeply etched into a brass plate that graced an otherwise nondescript metal door. It hissed open at McCade’s touch. As the bounty hunter stepped inside he found himself in a small but richly appointed lobby.
A middle-aged woman with a kindly face and two wings of dark hair looked up from a comp screen. “Welcome to the House of Yarl. My name is Portia. How may I help you?”
“We’re friends of Sister Urillo’s,” McCade replied. “She recommended that we stay here.”
“How nice,” the woman replied evenly. “How is Sister Urillo these days?”
“The kinesthetic feedback unit you sent her is much better than the old one. She can dance now.”
When Portia smiled her entire face lit up. “Excellent! It is as I hoped. There was a time when she loved dancing as much as flying. One, two, or three rooms?”
“Three,” Reba said firmly.
“I don’t know about you, but I feel insulted,” McCade said to Neem.
“Maybe it’s those cigars,” Neem replied. “They’re enough to drop an Ikk at thirty yards.”
The woman tapped away at her keyboard and looked up at the comp screen. “Your rooms are ready. Palm the counter, then palm the doors.”
McCade pressed his palm down on the counter, followed by Reba, then Neem.
Portia frowned at the alien’s gloved hand but decided to let it go. Anyone wearing gloves could open the thing’s door, but whatever lurked behind that visor could take care of itself and wouldn’t need any advice from her.
They were just turning to go when Portia turned on her professional smile. “Thank you for choosing the House o
f Yarl and have a nice stay.”
McCade smiled, nodded in her direction, and decided that he’d be satisfied if he got off the habitat alive.
Twenty-One
They’d been walking for about twenty minutes and the bright lights were far behind them. Every third or fourth light was burned out or shot out, McCade couldn’t tell which.
The walls were covered with graffiti, and garbage lined both sides of the corridor. The air was humid and carried the strong scent of urine. Every society has an underside and this was Tin Town’s.
The people who passed them were the dregs of a society focused on self. They padded the length of Tin Town’s less traveled corridors like human vultures, hoping to find the leavings of some predator, or to encounter a victim so weak that they could make the kill themselves.
But the threesome were well armed and moved with the confidence of those who know where they’re going and why. And since the vultures were ever fearful of becoming victims themselves, they gave the strangers a wide berth and went in search of weaker prey.
Nonetheless, there was the very real possibility of an ambush. The corridor practically screamed, “Danger! Run for your lives!”
So while Reba managed to look calm, her right hand hovered over her blaster, and there was a tightness in the way she moved. Her eyes jerked toward McCade when he spoke and then darted away.
“Where did you say we were going again?”
Reba frowned. “We’re looking for a good restaurant. Pay attention, Sam. We’re looking for a man called Scavenger Jack. Sister Urillo has him on a retainer. If Pong’s here, Jack will know.”
McCade was about to say something along the lines of “Well, excuse me,” when Neem snarled at the both of them.
“Cut the chatter, you two. Unless you’d like to come up and trade places with me.”
Il Ronnians are partially nocturnal and have better night sight than humans so Neem was leading the way. But he didn’t relish the assignment and wanted them to know it. Each side tunnel was a potential threat, and if someone started a firefight, he’d be the first to die.
“Tunnel eighty-seven. We’re getting close,” Reba said, pausing to read faded numbers. “Scavenger Jack lives in ninety-one right.”
They passed three more tunnels without incident and found themselves in front of one marked “91.” Unlike most this one was partially lit.
McCade stepped into the tunnel. “Watch our backs, Neem. We’d be like rats in a trap if this tunnel dead ends.”
“Rats in a trap,” Neem said experimentally. “I like that. Is it similar to being up feces creek without a paddle? And why travel on a creek filled with feces anyway?”
“Not now, Neem,” Reba replied impatiently. “Just watch our backs.” And so saying she followed McCade into the tunnel.
Neem started to make a rude gesture with his tail but remembered that she couldn’t see it and wouldn’t understand even if she could. He settled for a rude noise instead.
Turning, he backed his way up the tunnel, watching the main corridor for signs of trouble.
They were about a hundred feet into the tunnel when they heard the scream. It was long, drawn out, and undeniably human.
McCade drew his blaster and broke into a run. Another scream followed the first, this one going even higher, before dying into a low gurgle and disappearing altogether.
Up ahead a door slammed open and a shaft of light hit the far side of the tunnel. A shadow hit the wall as a man stepped out and turned their way. He took one look and drew his slug gun. “Come on, guys! We’ve got company!”
The man used a high velocity slug to punctuate his sentence. The slug blew air into McCade’s ear as it passed, hit the overhead, and screamed down the corridor. The chances were slim that it would go through the habitat’s hull, but it could happen. Stupid asshole.
McCade squeezed his trigger and punched an energy beam through the man’s chest. As he fell over backward more men came through the door and leaped his body. They had better sense and opened up with energy weapons.
Now Neem and Reba had joined the fray. Bolts of blue energy screamed up and down the tunnel. The two groups came together with a collective grunt just as another man fell. Knives flashed in the dim light and it was each person for himself.
McCade found himself paired off with a man in a blue uniform. He was short, ugly, and smelled of cheap cologne.
McCade tried to use his blaster but found his wrist locked in a grip of steel. Light flashed off the other man’s blade and McCade blocked it with a grip of his own. Now the two men tried to best each other through strength alone.
Though a full head shorter than McCade, the other man was as strong as an ox, and it was soon apparent that he’d win. He held his knife edge up, and in spite of McCade’s best efforts, each second brought the shining steel closer and closer. Any moment now and McCade would feel the first pinprick as the knife point broke his skin. Next would come the excruciating agony as the cold steel slid into his guts. His belly jerked back at the thought.
Neem’s voice came from behind. “Turn him around!”
McCade found that if he pulled with one arm and pushed with the other he could turn his opponent to the right.
“Get ready to die,” the man rasped through yellowing teeth. “I’m going to split you open like a ripe fava fruit.”
McCade didn’t waste precious energy on a reply. Instead, he used all of his remaining strength to push and pull at the same time.
It was then that he heard the whicker of cold steel and Neem’s Il Ronnian war cry. As the alien swung into sight his sword was already in motion and McCade did his best to duck.
The razor-sharp steel made a sucking sound as it passed through the man’s neck and came out the other side. There was a gout of bright red blood as the man’s head went one way and his body went another. They hit the metal deck with a double thump.
McCade swayed slightly as he looked around. His arms still hurt where the other man had gripped them. A glance informed him that Reba was okay and that the rest of the assailants had fled. Neem was using a corpse to wipe the blood off his blade.
Seeing McCade’s look, Neem grinned behind his visor. “While in college I took a course in the fabrication and use of ancient weapons. Standard stuff for anthropologists and, as it turns out, quite useful as well.”
McCade shook his head in amazement. “You never cease to amaze me, Neem.You are a crazy bastard.”
“You can say that again,” Reba agreed. “And a good thing too. Come on. Let’s see what’s inside.”
McCade went through the door fast and low, his blaster searching for a target. There was none.
The inside came as a complete surprise. He’d expected some sort of hovel, a metal cave complete with piles of junk, and a grizzled old man who called himself “Scavenger Jack.”
Nothing could’ve been further from the truth. Far from being a metal cave, Scavenger Jack’s foyer was larger than McCade’s hotel room and better decorated as well. The floors were marble, the walls were covered with rich red fabric, and the light fixtures dripped crystal. For some reason the man chose to live in a remote and almost deserted part of the habitat.
“Over here.” Neem had pushed a door open with the point of his sword.
McCade followed the Il Ronnian through the door and found himself in a formal sitting room. It was filled to overflowing with richly upholstered furniture, fine paintings, and small pieces of Finthian sculpture. Something caught his eye and he moved over to investigate.
“This is amazing,”Reba said quietly. “Who’d believe you could find something like this just off tunnel ninety-one? Scavenger Jack sure knows how to live.”
“And how to die,” McCade added. “Look at this.”
Scavenger Jack was lying behind a couch. In life he’d been a handsome man with curly brown hair and a thick mustache. He wore a surprised expression as if he’d known how things were supposed to turn out and this wasn’t it.<
br />
McCade couldn’t blame him. Scavenger Jack was not a pretty sight. Neither was the knife that protruded from his chest. First they’d worked him over, which explained the screams and the condition of his fingernails. They’d pried them off one at a time. McCade wondered why. Did it have something to do with Pong? Or was it totally unconnected? There was no way to tell.
“Damn.” Reba made it a comment and an expression of sorrow all in one.
“Yeah,” McCade agreed. “Not a very nice way to go.”
“There’s no such thing as a ‘nice way to go,’ Neem observed. “And I suggest we leave lest we suffer a similar fate. They might come back.”
Neem’s suggestion made a lot of sense so they wasted little time slipping out the door and into the tunnel.
There was no way to tell if Scavenger Jack had a next of kin, or if the habitat’s founders believed in concepts like legal inheritance, but they closed the door just in case.
It closed with the solid thump common to bank vaults everywhere, and now that McCade looked more closely, he realized the door and frame were made of hull metal. Though a bit eccentric, Scavenger Jack was no fool.
All of which made McCade curious. Given the fact that an energy cannon wouldn’t even scratch the door, how had the killers managed to get inside?
The obvious answer was that Scavenger Jack knew his killers and decided to let them in. That, plus his surprised expression, suggested friends. Or people he thought were friends.
The bodies were right where they’d left them and Reba’s knife flashed as she cut something off the headless corpse, stuck it in a pocket, and moved down tunnel.
The walk back was long but uneventful. As they approached the hotel Mc-Cade saw a number of police and, what with his bloodstained clothing and heavily armed companions, felt more than a little conspicuous.
But this was Tin Town, and unless the police had some reason to suspect that someone had attacked one of their clients, then there was nothing to fear.
McCade decided to visit his room prior to joining the others. So when he entered Neem’s room a half hour later he was showered, shaved, and feeling much better.
McCade on the Run (Sam McCade Omnibus) Page 13
